What is Twitter for?
Ten years since launch Twitter remains a solution looking for a problem.
When it first came out nobody knew and it didn’t matter. It was simple and fun and fresh and silly. You could use it for whatever you wanted. It was a solution looking for a problem. And the people of the Internet stepped up and found many problems that Twitter solve, or at least distract us from.
The creators of Twitter had no mission beyond seeing what happened. They didn’t expect it to take off. It surprised them.
Contrast this with Facebook which always had the explicit mission of connecting people together online. Or Google, which always wanted to organize the world’s information. These weren’t just proof of concept web apps thrown online to see what happened. They were true MVPs — the first small step towards an epic, world changing mission.
Twitter did take off and grew fast. Twitter responded to its own growth by iterating the product in response to how people used it. But growth without direction is dangerous. Here’s the classic MVP image:
If you want to build a car, launch a skateboard and iterate. That’s fine. In this image the company that launches the skateboard knows what they’re doing and where they want to go. That’s what Facebook and Google did.
But what happens if you just put a skateboard out into the world with no sense of future purpose or direction? And then what happens if it takes off? Everybody will use it to solve a different problem. Some people will use it for transport. Some to keep fit. Some to perform daring tricks. Some to make it easier to move heavy boxes around their garage. The skateboard manufacturer, seeing all these innovative uses, will iterate and grow. They’ll add weird features to the skateboard. Some will make it a better form of transport. Some will make it better for tricks. Some will make it better for load bearing.
And eventually it will be a horrible Frankenstein of a product. Eventually it will be impossible to please all users. Adding an engine might make it a better form of transport, but worse as a fitness tool. Adding safety straps will make it better for load bearing, but worse for daring tricks. And people will wonder what’s it really for?
Lots of people want to explain what’s wrong with Twitter. I’d argue it’s really a simple problem: Twitter has never found a purpose. It’s a solution that was looking for a problem, and found many, not compatible.
Today the sign up screen for Facebook says:
Facebook helps you connect and share with the people in your life.
That’s ALWAYS been the mission of Facebook. You can go back nine years and the homepage is just a wordier version of the same statement. Connect with people you know.
Twitter, on the other hand:
Connect with your friends — and other fascinating people. Get in-the-moment updates on the things that interest you. And watch events unfold, in real time, from every angle.
So that’s 4 different purposes right there. Connect with friends! Connect with strangers! Get updates! Watch events! And anybody who uses Twitter knows that this doesn’t begin to cover it all. There are so many other reasons: Argue! Get celebrities to notice you! Be a thought leaderer! Build a professional network that’s less dismal than LinkedIn!
One problem with growth is that you can’t worry only about your users problems. You have to worry about your own too. You have shareholders, employees, customers all with expectations. Twitter has a stock valuation it has to justify to investors, whether users like it or not.
I continue to like and use Twitter. It’s still fun and playful. And it’s the only major social network that’s designed to help you find new people, a social network for networking. But this isn’t what most people use Twitter for, and it’s not the use case Twitter is most interested in. Moments shows they’re trying to solve a problem, but not mine. And probably not yours.
